Schmitz said he was planning on getting his last two trimesters at once by joining both the golf team and the baseball team this spring.

“But,” Schmitz said, “I figured out that my baseball won’t count.”

Schmitz was asked to leave the team after missing a practice without permission.

A transfer in the middle of his sophomore year, Schmitz played football at Davis High School the fall semester before he arrived and is confident that that his participation will fulfill the one trimester he lacks.

Senior Emma Brown, however, likes that she’s fulfilling her requirements at the very end.

In her senior year, Brown has been taking studio art, a year-long elective.

“I haven’t taken art since middle school,” Brown said, “so it was a nice change of pace for my academic schedule.”

Other students are searching out tiny tasks to add to their already busy calendars to fulfill their 50-hour community service requirements. Senior Zoe Dym is one.

“I grab onto any opportunity,” Dym said. “I’ve done a bunch of little odd jobs. I’ve tutored (sixth-grader) Joe (White), cleaned the art room, taught the drawing class and I did a painting for the high school play.”

But Dym said she’s not anxious about finding enough hours.

“I’m not stressed about anything related to school,” Dym said.

Neither is senior Johann Dias, who said he appreciates having to deal with requirements.

Dias, who plans to tutor a St. Francis student to complete his three remaining community service hours, thinks that community service requirements teach students a lesson.

“I can’t really complain or promote (the community service hours),” Dias said, “but they do teach us necessary lessons of giving and not receiving. That’s what they are to me.”

“I knew I needed one more (P.E.) credit going into senior year,” Ochoa said, “so I decided to do cross country. Very early on in the season, I realized that it was going to be pretty (taxing) on my knees, and after one practice I could barely even walk.”

Ochoa’s knee problems forced him to quit track and instead begin physical therapy, which he planned to use as independent PE.